Russia’s Energy Policies in Eurasia: Empowerment or Entrapment?

Abstract

This chapter examines the place of energy and energy diplomacy in Moscow’s assessment of its national interest and in the implementation of its foreign policy. Looking at Russia’s main policy options, it argues that Moscow has been pursuing the goal of internal consolidation as the basis for its external projection. This is visible in its multivectorial foreign policy where Russia seeks to affirm its interests in a wider area, with primacy being given to the post-Soviet space, in particular the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Multipolarity has been defined as the key to the organisation of the international system where Russia wants to be treated as a major partner. In this context of reassertion the role of resource diplomacy has been central. Oil and gas as sources of substantial revenue have allowed the stabilisation of internal politics, the centralisation of power and the consolidation of the regime. Russia’s power projection has to a great extent been the result of this consolidation, demonstrating the relevance attached by Russian leaders to the internal/external dichotomy:

Russia possesses great energy resources — its territory contains 1/3 of the world natural gas reserves, 1/10 of oil reserves, 1/5 of coal reserves and 14% of uranium reserves — and a powerful fuel and energy complex, which is the basis of economic development and the instrument of carrying the internal and external policy. (Ministry of Energy of the Russian Federation, 2003, p. 2)